president obama and house speaker john boehner spoke by phone yesterday as democrats and republicans continue to dig their heels in over this budget standoff. there's been no announcement of any new face the face talks as lawmakers try to reach a deal to avoid the so called fiscal cliff in january. treasury secretary tim geithner tells cnbc republicans have made a little progress, but the obama administration is "absolutely ready to go over the cliff if the gop doesn't agree to raise tax rates on wealthy americans." apple has lost a bit of its shine. the tech giant stock suffering its worst day in four years on thursday. several factors may have been at play. investors worried apple may be giving up ground in the tablet market to rivals, while nokia beat the company to the punch. there are also unconfirmed reports a stock clearinghouse firm is reducing the margin requirements on apple stock. apple lost $35 billion in market value yesterday. to put that into perspective, there are 417 companies listed on the s&p 500 index that have a market cap below $35 billion, so the jimmer fredet